Waubonsee Community College

Natives and newcomers, Canada's "Heroic age" reconsidered, Bruce G. Trigger

eng

Includes bibliographical references (pages 357-397) and index

illustrations

index present

non fiction

Natives and newcomers

bibliography

14129411

Bruce G. Trigger

Canada's "Heroic age" reconsidered

According to convential nineteenth-century wisdom, societies of European origin were naturally progressive; native societies were static. One consequence of this attitutde was the almost universal separation of history and anthropology. Today, despite a growing interest in changes in Amerindian societies, this dichotomy continues to distort the investigation of Canadian history and to assign native peoples only a marginal place in it. Natives and Newcomers discredits that myth. In a spirited and critical re-examination of relations between the French and the Iroquoian-speaking inhabitants of the St Lawrence lowlands, from the incursions of Jacques Cartier through the explorations of Samuel de Champlain and the Jesuit missions into the early years of the royal regime, Natives and Newcomers argues that native people have played a significant role in shaping the development of Canada. Trigger also shows that the largely ignored French traders and their employees established relations with native people that were indispensable for founding a viable European colony on the St Lawrence. The brisk narrative of this period is complemented by a detailed survey of the stereotypes about native people that have influenced the development of Canadian history and anthropology and by candid discussions of how historical, ethnographical, and archaeological approaches can and cannot be combined to produce a more rounded and accurate understanding of the past

1. The Indian image in Canadian history [anthropology, Charlevoix tradition, Victorian anthropology, etc.] -- 2. Before history [prehistory, archaeology, prehistoric hunter-gatherers, transition to food-producation, consolidation of village life, etc.] -- The Approach of the Europeans, 1497-1600 [Boasian anthropology, ethnographic present, early Europeans contact, Jacques Cartier, disappearance of the St. Lawrence Iroquoians, etc.] -- Traders and colonizers, 1600-1632 [fur trade and warfare, nature of Indian trade, European traders, French administrators, Missionaries, Impact on Native peoples [Aboriginal, First Nations], etc.] -- Plagues and preachers, 1632-1663 [Jesuits, killing years, epidemics, converstions and factionalism, destruction of the Hurons, Iroquois Supremacy, Iroquois missions, etc.] -- Who founded New France? [northern El Dorado, monopolists and free traders, colonizers against traders, Jesuit mission colony, etc.]